That’s without even taking into account the record prize pool of nearly $53 million that will be up for grabs in this week’s main event at the Rio in Las Vegas.

That’s some serious scratch, for sure. But, the long-term money to be made from successfully marketing products to the disposable-income segment of society that has made poker one of the hottest industries in the world will make the $7.5 million prize that goes to this year’s WSOP champ look like chump change.

Think about the NASCAR revolution of the past decade — taking that sport from the fringes of American society to make it the fastest-growing sport in the country — and you have an idea of what these poker companies are envisioning for the “sport” they have hitched their wagons to in the search for an ever-expanding consumer base.

“It has become a lot like NASCAR,” says Eric Morris, the co-president of Bluff Media. “In NASCAR, people have a favorite driver and they are very loyal to that driver and the products he markets. It is becoming that way in poker, now. People have favorite players, because they associate with them for whatever reason, and they are very loyal to those players. A lot of companies are trying to tap into that loyalty.”

And, like NASCAR, the main way to advertise to that passionate fan base is to turn the poker circuit’s stars into walking billboards.

Steve Baker, the CEO of Cyber World Group, a privately owned Internet management company that counts the Golden Palace Casino website among its clients, argues that poker marketing is even more in-your-face than the omnipresent shilling that has become a trademark of NASCAR events.

First, he correctly argues that there is really no centralized authority that can regulate the products that are endorsed by poker players. NASCAR has central control over its sponsors and in the past has banned controversial products like tobacco and hard liquor from appearing on its vehicles or the uniforms of its drivers. Poker has no such qualms.

Poker pros Howard Lederer and Erick Lindgren, 2004 World Poker Tour Player of the Year, recently inked deals to endorse Jim Beam’s Knob Creek Bourbon. Almost anything still goes in the Wild West mentality that has risen from poker’s sudden, and mostly unexpected, emergence as a staple of popular culture.

Secondly, Baker believes the market has become saturated with advertisements as rounders — for so long on the fringes of polite society — eagerly attempt to cash in on their mainstream acceptance by signing as many endorsement deals as humanly possible.

Any professional worth his weight in chips has a deal with an online poker room. Chris Moneymaker and Greg Raymer, unknown amateurs who came from obscurity to win each of the last two WSOPs, have deals to promote the popular site Poker Stars. Other pros have jumped into the fray by starting their own online poker rooms. Established pros Phil Ivey, Chris “Jesus” Ferguson, Phil Gordon and Lederer are among the pros that have provided the legitimacy to Full Tilt poker.

Throughout the month-long WSOP, all of these players have taken every opportunity to don hats and shirts that proclaim, often as loudly as possible — their marketing affiliations.

Other players freely sell their souls to pitch products.

“The hats and T-shirts have become so commonplace that I think people are almost oblivious to them,” says Baker. “It’s like driving down the road and looking at billboard after billboard, after a while you don’t even notice them.

“But, the World Series has become so large that all the advertisement at the tables is necessary, but not nearly as effective.”

It may be necessary, but it certainly can be jarring as competing product placements vie for attention at each table. It almost makes poker diehards long for the days when players were known for their off-the-beaten-path sartorial splendor or their poker-playing idiosyncrasies.

“It’s obnoxious to me, and that’s coming from a guy that works in PR,” says Darren Shuster, a Los Angeles-based public relations guru that has several ties to the poker world.

Make no mistake, not all of the measures companies undertake are meant to be obnoxious.

Bluff Magazine, a new publication that caters to the poker lifestyle, is offering Bubble Insurance. Simply put, Bluff has offered to cover the $10,000 buy-in for next year’s WSOP to the last five players eliminated before the money portion of this year’s main event. The catch: The players must be wearing a black shirt advertising the magazine on the day they are eliminated.

“We were trying to find a way to get some media attention and have something that could help the players out, as well,” said Morris, who briefly considered giving away $1 million. “We understand that we have to be creative to operate in this marketplace and we think we have done that with Bluff Insurance and some of the other things we are doing here at the World Series.”

But, others are, shall we say, a bit louder in their attention-getting machinations.

Nobody is as creative in promoting its products as Golden Palace, the frontrunners in these types of guerrilla marketing. Golden Palace, remember, was the first to put its ad on a boxer’s back. It is also the company that has regularly scoured eBay looking for unique opportunities to get out its brand name.

The results have been surreal as the company has amassed an impressive collection of oddities, including such unique items as the Virgin Mary Grilled Cheese Sandwich, Britney Spears’ Pregnancy Test, Marilyn Monroe’s personal address book, and Pope Benedict XVI’s previously-owned VW Golf; all of which have garnered extensive worldwide media attention for the casino.

“Golden Palace has taken guerrilla marketing to a level I have never seen before,” says Shuster, slightly envious.

This year, Golden Palace has a number of fronts it is working in the marketing department. The most conventional involves having top pros represent the site. Some of their other promotions, however, are more on the cutting edge of marketing techniques.

Perhaps the most controversial involves Golden Palace’s bid of $15,100 on eBay to win the services of Jeremy Enke, who is competing at the WSOP in a pink bunny suit. According to Drew Lack, the creative marketing director at Cyber World Group, the original deal to have Enke wear a pink bunny suit emblazoned with the words “GoldenPalace.com” was nixed by WSOP organizers. Enke does wear the bunny suit around the WSOP floor when he is not playing.

“We’re just having fun with it,” Baker says of his Golden Palace aggressive marketing schemes. “Our marketing is about trying to have fun and make people laugh. It’s what I call advertainment. We want people to say, ‘I wonder what Golden Palace is going to do next.’ ”

Judging by this year’s pushing of the envelope, that may be all too common a sentiment uttered by fans about many marketing companies at major poker tournaments to come.

For more information contact:
Lindsey Rarick
Pop Culture Public Relations
(818) 992-3145
lindsey@popculturepr.com

Eric Morris
Publisher
Bluff Media
+1 (678) 528-0379
eric@bluffmedia.com

About Bluff Magazine (www.bluffmagazine.com):
Bluff Magazine is America’s Largest Poker Magazine with 225,000 copies printed and distributed nationwide. Bluff’s 125,000 newsstand copies and 100,000 event and location copies gets Bluff into the hands of any poker enthusiasts eager to keep up with the fast-paced modern poker lifestyle.

Related posts:

1. Jerry Yang’s World Series of Poker Money to Help Feed the Children As his year as defending World Champion begins to come...
2. BetUS.com and Bluff Magazine Are Set to “Rock” The World Series of Poker July 21, 2006 (London) – BetUS.com and Bluff Magazine are...
3. World Series of Poker Circuit Event Continues at Caesars Palace The World Series of Poker Circuit Championship at Caesars Palace,...
4. World Series of Poker Live Radio Broadcast Concludes Inaugural Year Atlanta, GA (August 18, 2006). BLUFF MEDIA, publisher of Bluff...
5. Bluff Magazine Teams up with MansionPoker.net For World Series of Poker Main Event Bubble Insurance Atlanta, GA 23 May 2006. Bluff Magazine (www.bluffmagazine.com), Americas leading...